The Winners of the 2014 Independent Handbag Designer Awards Are...

While big luxury brands are always launching and promoting their increasingly exotic, exclusive and expensive handbags — often to very lucrative effect — it's a lot more difficult for a handbag designer to launch a handbag-only line on her own, without being attached to an already-established name.

Only a few people have done it and found mainstream success: Rebecca Minkoff, Kate Spade and Monica Botkier most notably. More recently, Reece Solomon (of Reece Hudson) and Rachel Mansur and Floriana Gavriel (of Mansur Gavriel) come to mind.

A pool of 1,500 applicants from all over the world was narrowed down to 30 finalists (five per category), who were voted on by industry judges including Rafe Totengco, Deborah Lloyd of Kate Spade, Kenneth Cole, Carlos Falchi, Erica Russo of Bloomingdale's, Lauren Bush Lauren and Suesan Falkner of Guess. Each winner is featured in the all-important September issue of InStyle and the recipient of the Best Handbag in Overall Style and Design award gets his or her bags sold in select Bloomingale's locations this fall.

ADVERTISEMENT

Thanks for watching!

ADVERTISEMENT

Thanks for watching!

With so many big names already involved in the event's eighth year, we're sure this is a program that will only get bigger and better over time, especially given Blumenthal's unrelenting determination to bring indie handbag designers into the spotlight.

Without further ado, read on for the winners:

The Optitex Best Student Made Handbag: Morgan Richards of Morgan Rhea, The Savannah College of Art and Design, USA

These bags were created during the students' education. The winner gets of full suite of Optitex 3D modeling software as well as an internship at Coach.

The Bernina Best Handmade Handbag: Gili Rozin Tamam of MeDusa, Israel

Made by hand, machine sewn, crocheted or knitted, the winner will receive the Bernina 560 sewing machine (with a retail value of $5,000) as well as the opportunity to be an ambassador for the brand, creating blogs and projects for social media.

The Timberland Best Green Handbag: Carolina Riffi Ollite-Hopman of Carat23, The Netherlands

These bags are made from renewable, organic, or recycled materials. The winner will receive the chance to have his or her product displayed at select Timberland stores.

The FEED Most Socially Responsible Handbag: Monica Frisbie of Mondrina, USA, Made in Peru

All entries meet certain ethical and moral standards in regards to production, employment and philanthropy while impacting the local culture. The winner, chosen by Lauren Bush Lauren, will receive a feature on social business FEED's website, feedprojects.com.

Distinctly Denim by Guess Handbags: Tika Kuchukhidze of Tika, Spain

These designers used denim to reflect the Guess brand. The winner gets his or her bag sold on Guess.com.

Best Handbag in Overall Style and Design: John Edwards of Florian London, UK

These bags represent the best-executed handbag in overall style and design. The winner will receive a booth at WWD Magic and the opportunity to have his line carried at Bloomingdale's.

Subscribe to Our Newsletter

Former handbag designer Emily Blumenthal runs an annual awards show to spotlight up-and-coming handbag designers. From launching her own successful handbag line to writing a book, to launching a reality TV show, Blumenthal embodies the independent spirit she awards in others.

The fashion Oscars CFDA awards have wrapped: The Olsens took home the big prize for womenswear for the Row (they very adorably thanked each other); Seth Meyers wore Marc Jacobs' Met ball outfit (and dared to make a Galliano joke); Garance Dore had folks tearing up when she accepted her award by telling the audience to "take your fun very seriously...[and] maybe one day you will start a revolution"; and John Waters proved the perfect person to pick up awards for both Comme des Garçons‘ Rei Kawakubo ("I wear Comme des Garcons to be fashionable in private...We know how great her clothes look but others just think we're poor") and Johnny Depp ("He has fashion balls...he was a pirate Pepe Le Pew way before I met him"). And the industry recognized its finest talents this year.
Without further ado, the 2012 CFDA award winners:

Clare Vivier’s eponymous handbag line all started with a simple laptop case. Struggling to find a fashion-meets-function bag to suit her busy lifestyle, the former television journalist simply designed one herself. The rest, as they say, is fashion history.
We caught up with Vivier to learn more about how she managed to build her brand from scratch--and as it turns out, she's far from slowing down with lots of plans on the horizon (like doing footwear--yes please--and a store in NYC). Read on to find out how she does it...